PUTTING aside for the moment that the Junction Beer Hall & Wine Room is a great place to down some good- quality alcohol and food, this recently renovated art deco pub also provides an excellent snapshot of several trends in the Melbourne bar scene.

The first of these is about the location. Newport is not one of the city's best-known suburbs and, for those in the self-obsessed east, it may not have registered at all. So this handsome pub is not only in the west - an area increasingly turning heads as more food and drink-related businesses hang out their shingle there - but also in a relatively unknown part of the west. Melburnians love an untapped resource. Even handier, it's an untapped resource with a train station just across the road.

Second, the Junction has divided itself into two distinct areas, both with more than one eye on the Zeitgeist. At one end is the new Wine Room, with its more upmarket menu, loungey looks, table service, lengthy wine list and dedicated cocktail list. Cocktails are all the rage in Melbourne now.

On the other side is the larger and more clattery (well, almost deafening really, when the crowd gets raucous) beer hall, with its immense beer list, beer-friendly pub food and breezy decor that includes metal stools, original timber and a giant mural reproduction of John Brack's The Bar.

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Obscure, artisan and boutique brewery beer is another ''so hot right now'' bar trend but the list at the Junction is not one put together by a trend-spotter - there is research and passion happening here with a selection that includes about seven beers on tap (maybe a Boatrocker Hoppbier, $6.50) and then a huge selection of the bottled stuff from Australia, New Zealand, the US, Belgium, Japan, Denmark, Germany and Norway. The Hitachino White (from Japan, $11), with its coriander and citrus notes, proves to be friendly with food.

The menu has a good list of small dishes, such as fried chickpeas with cumin salt ($7) for the snackers, but there are plenty of meal-sized dishes of the steak and veal schnitzel variety that are simple, well-cooked and satisfying.

The Junction ticks enough boxes to be studied in an anthropological fashion but, with its good service, friendly attitude and commitment to quality, dispassionate observation would be missing the point.